30 April 2013

Jason Collins Has “Reframed the Conversation” Around Sports, Blacks and Homophobia

John Amaechi, who was the first former NBA player to come out as gay, told me the he was not surprised the first out, active male player would be from the NBA. "I expect that the next three or four" professional sports players to come out could also be Black players, Amaechi told EBONY.

Jason Collins has demonstrated that you can “be Black, gay, out and play
professional sports,” former NFL player Wade Davis told EBONY.
Davis played for the Seattle Seahawks and Washington Redskins and came
out after retirement. “Now people need to reframe the conversation
around African-Americans and homophobia. Jason Collins said that he is a
Black, gay man. Many other players who have supported him, such as Kobe
[Bryant] and Dwayne [Wade] are also Black.

Comments

Rod, I very much appreciate this article because the gay media and blogs have never acknowleged the importance of this for Black gay men -- and you can bet if he were white the question would be, "Why coudn't a black man do it first? Most of the NBA is black."

And I will will co-siagn what Bart said. I listened to the show and thought you were great at mantaining your cool with the "crazy talk."

Glenn was out to his teammates and owners but NOT the public. Per the article:

"Unfortunately the high-profile cases of early, out Black pro-athletes have been marked by tragedy. Glenn Burke, superstar centerfielder for the Los Angeles Dodgers, was the “first and only Major League Baseball player known to have been out to his teammates” and team owners during his professional career in the 1970s. Burke was later ostracized by teams and died from AIDS-related causes in 1995."

Jason Collins's coming out is a total and complete paradigm shift. From this point forward, it is going to be very difficult to type cast black gay men as down low, oblivious, and unconcerned about gay civil rights.

What is equally impressive is the warm and embracing reaction by past and present marquee-level black professional athletes like Kobe, Lebron, Meta World Peace, Dwayne Wade, Shaq, Chris Bosch, Charles Barkley and others. Our struggle in the black gay community is far from over, but Jason has helped us to make great strides forward.

Yes, Rod, I co-sign with Bart and DT. I listened to you on the radio on Tuesday and you were a gentleman. When that fool said that Collins would not be picked up by any team because he'd be like having "a woman on the court" I screamed. I'm glad you didn't.

But that's Philadelphia folks for ya'. I've been here for 55 years and still haven't escaped.